Specialized infection control packages can track, analyze and therefore prevent surgical site infections, saving lives and lowering costs. But reporting remains problematic everyone clamors for transparency, but SSIs are non-reimbursable, which discourages reporting. Can software solve this quandary?

Hosted services have been an IT staple in other industries for a decade or more. Now, like never before, hospital IT departments are turning to web hosting and portal-based approaches to access, store, maintain and exchange a widening range of electronic data. With 35 trillion gigabytes (GB) of digital information expected to be created and replicated by 2020, according to a recent report by IDC, moving to a hosted system might become a necessity for healthcare organizations that dont want to be in the data storage business.

It is a bigger jump than a lot of us understand to transition from the way the traditional exposition of medical knowledge exists today, to the implementation of information systems. Its time we make that journey, even though the adoption levels are just beginning to climb the Gartner hype cycle.

Boston Scientific has filed financial results for its second quarter, ending June 30, which were adversely affected by the FDA's halt on defibrillator systems, along with falling stent sales.

Socio-economic factors may impact physicians' decisions to treat patients with drug-eluting stents (DES). A study published in the July issue of the Journal of the American College of Cardiology: Cardiovascular Interventions showed that African-American patients, Medicaid beneficiaries and the uninsured were least likely to receive DES during PCI procedures.

Improvements in slide scanning, image management and analysis technologies, and are pushing digital pathology systems forward. At the same time, the demand for faster, more accurate diagnoses is increasing. The result? Market researcher Frost & Sullivan has estimated that digital pathology hardware and software systems could become a $2 billion industry during the next decade.

By assigning one password for all applications, single sign on (SSO) technology gives clinicians speedy access to the apps they need. Armed with SSO, users neednt write down (then lose) passwords. So whats the catch? These techniques wont streamline access if all necessary apps arent included under the SSO umbrella, and health IT leaders must make sure their organizations password protection and security policies can accommodate an SSO framework.

The inaugural CMIO 2010 Top Trends and CMIO Census gauged health IT leaders thoughts about the HITECH Act with three questions: Would the act achieve its goals within five years? Will more money be needed for it to achieve those goals? What were the biggest organizational obstacles to implementation? To a certain extent, the responses to these questions show how our perceptions of the HITECH Act, and health IT in general, have evolved nationally.